Long time ago, perhaps in 2003 or 2004, my English professor at OISE/UT shared a perspective on how children gain or lose their interest in language learning, and in literacy. She asked us to imagine 2 children at their breakfast tables. Both these children are eating cereal and their eyes are drawn to the picture of a submarine on the cereal box. They both ask their parents the same question, "what's that?". One parent responds with "shut up and eat your cereal!" and the other goes into an elaborate explanation that ends in the Beatles' song about a yellow submarine. The inference from the telling of this tale is that one of the children was given the opportunity to learn and grow, whereas the other child's learning was cut short before it began!
For the longest time, I understood this story as a failure or a success of a parent in terms of starting their children off right! Now, my perspective has changed.
What if the first parent was a single parent who is struggling to pay bills, and has to be at his/her job in the next few minutes before dropping off the child at a daycare on the way to work? This parent's mind is so preoccupied with how to survive on a daily basis that there is no energy to have a leisurely conversation with his/her child! On the other hand, the second parent is perhaps in a privileged position to stay at home or work from home. S/he has the time to have those conversations with his/her child.
Do we continue to blame the parents or do we shift the focus to the privilege that some of us enjoy?
When I made the decision of being a stay at home parent, I didn't think of privilege - I just saw it as a choice. However, with all the recent knowledge I have gained, I would have to say that having the ability to make a choice is a bigtime privilege. And yet not all privileges are the same. My choice placed some stress on Craigley in terms of carrying the burden of all the bill payments including mortgage. We had to think twice about going on family vacations. Even road trips decreased the available balance in the line of credit. There was guilt on one side and resentment on the other.
Would I make different choices if I was given the opportunity to go back in time? Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on perspective, I would make the same decisions.
A few weeks ago, ASid told me that he missed me the most in the last 5 months of his Grade 12 school year. He enjoyed talking to his mother in the mornings, over breakfast, before he was off to school. The mornings, during those 5 months, his mother was rushing out to do her job as a supply teacher. I was not available to him. ASid was not complaining, he was simply sharing his feelings. He also told me that I am a good mother and he is thankful. He has heard a few horror stories about other parents from other students at university!
Are the parents truly horrible or are they themselves victims of their horrible circumstances? We have to look at it one parent at a time and one situation at a time.
